


Almost Icarus

by ellijay



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-15
Updated: 2016-11-15
Packaged: 2018-08-31 05:31:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8565850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ellijay/pseuds/ellijay
Summary: Missing scene for "42" – because I can't believe the Doctor could be bombarded with radiation, possessed by a living sun and fight tooth and nail for control of his own mind, then jump right up and be fine. Even Time Lords must have their limits.





	1. Scorched Wings

When the living sun left the Doctor, it felt as though all of the warmth, breath and blood in his body were torn out with it. As he rolled onto his back, he realized at least one of those was true. He couldn’t breathe. Respiratory bypass wasn’t kicking in, and the frenetic beat of his left heart told him why – only one of his hearts was working, and it was pounding hard and fighting to keep a steady rhythm.

Just as the edges of his vision were starting to blacken, the Pentallian pitched hard to the side, throwing him against the bulkhead. A searing pain ripped through the right side of his chest, and after a crazed moment of thinking his right heart had literally burst, he realized it was beating again, strong and steady. A dim, dispassionately calm part of his mind noted his impact with the wall must’ve restarted it. But he still couldn’t breathe.

The whine of the auxiliary engines firing barely registered through the roaring in his ears as black spots bubbled across his vision. Just as he was about to slip over the edge into unconsciousness and probable death and regeneration, stabbing pains slamming through his chest told him his respiratory bypass system had just come back to life.

As the ship slowly righted itself, he rolled back across the floor and stopped with his forehead pressed hard against the deck of the ship. That faltering rational part of his brain noted the floor was absolutely filthy, while inside his chest, both hearts and respiratory bypass struggled to synchronize. Nausea rose, and just as he thought he was going to be sick, his lungs sucked breath back into his body. He almost choked as the inrush of air collided with the bile in the back of his throat.

He lay there heaving huge, ragged breaths, his eyes squeezing shut as he tried desperately to calm himself, to relinquish control to his autonomic systems so they could readjust his body functions. Part of him struggled against giving up any kind of control so soon after almost losing all he had to the living sun, but the calm voice in the back of his mind soothed him, told him to let go. With one last surge of panic, he did let go, and in only a few moments, hearts and lungs synchronized. It felt as if his entire chest were humming, but then he realized that was just the auxiliary engines ramping up to full speed, the vibrations buzzing through his body.

The steady throb of the ship, combined with the awareness that the sun was being left further and further behind with every moment, finally calmed him to the point where he was able to open his eyes and gather his tenuous strength to begin struggling up off the deck. But something still wasn’t right. He just wasn’t quite sure what it was.


	2. Sea of Fire

The overwhelming rush of relief Martha felt at realizing they weren’t going to burn up in the sun after all was quickly replaced by a sinking feeling of dread as she realized the Doctor might not have survived along with them. She turned and ran back along the length of the ship, her guts twisting with fear. She could only hope the living sun had let him go without blasting his mind and body in the process.

As soon as she caught sight of him slowly pulling himself to his feet, fierce relief and pure joy fused inside of her, and she threw herself into his arms. She felt him stagger a bit as he wrapped his arms tightly around her and lifted her right off the floor. Adrenalin was making her head swim, and she realized he must be feeling much the same as he laughed – no, practically giggled – into her ear.

She tightened her arms around his neck, her breath catching in her throat as she thought about how close she’d come to losing him, how she would’ve been dead herself if not for him. She squeezed her eyes shut against tears.

She was so lost in a crashing mix of conflicting emotions that she didn’t notice at first that he had put her back on the floor and his arms were loosening around her waist. Her eyes snapped open with the realization that he wasn’t standing upright any longer, that he was beginning to crumple to the floor and taking her with him.

She shifted her arms quickly to his waist and tried to at least control his fall, which she barely managed to do. Quick instinct made one of her hands shoot out behind his head just in time to keep it from slamming into the floor. He groaned, shut his eyes, took a deep breath through his nose and let it back out of his mouth with a gasp.

She leaned over him, patted gently at his cheek and called to him in a shaking voice, panic threatening to strangle her. “Doctor? Doctor! What is it? What’s wrong?” He rolled his head from one side to the other and mumbled something. She leaned closer. “Doctor? I didn’t hear you. What did you say?”

She turned her ear to his face in time to hear him whisper, “Too hot. I’m too hot.”

She sat back up, confused. “What do you mean, too hot? The sun particles left you, didn’t they?”

He nodded slightly, cleared his throat and said with a bit more strength, “Yes. Felt every last one of them go.” He grimaced, coughed a bit. “My internal temperature regulation seems to have gone a bit haywire in the process.”

She laid her hand on his forehead, then snatched it back as she found heat much greater than she expected. She managed to gather her wits enough to say in a somewhat steady voice, “I’d say so. It’s still very hot in here, but you’re significantly warmer than the ambient temperature.”

The answer was not what she expected. “Oooh, ambient temperature. I love it when you talk scientific, Martha Jones.” He opened his eyes, smiled faintly at her and said in a tired voice, “I’d try to think of something similarly sexy and scientific to say, but my brain is just a bit singed at the moment. You’ll have to settle for ‘please help me sit up.’”

Somewhat relieved to hear him sounding something like normal, she said, “Let’s get this collar off you first. Looks a bit heavy.”

He frowned, then said, “Oh, you mean the space suit. Latches are down there…on my chest somewhere. I don’t quite remember.” His voice grew soft, vague, distant, and his eyes slid half-closed.

Her fingers fumbled with the latches, but she managed to get them undone relatively quickly. She tugged at the bottom of the collar, but it only lifted a bit. Her concern for the Doctor was fogging her brain, and it took her a moment to realize there must be latches at the back as well. She grabbed his arm, shook him gently. “Doctor?”

He turned his head slowly towards her, squeezed his eyes tightly shut, then opened them again and blinked quickly. It was obvious he was having difficulty focusing on her, but he finally managed to fix her with a hard stare. “I’m still on the floor, aren’t I?”

She nodded. “I need you to help me a bit to get you up off the floor, okay?” His eyelids started flickering again. She wasn’t entirely certain he’d heard or understood what she’d just said. “Doctor?” she said a bit louder and more firmly.

He flinched a bit, opened his eyes wide and cleared his throat. “Yes, yes, I’m here.” He shuddered as he let out a sharp breath. “Still burning up.”

“I know,” she said, “I know. We’ll get to that in just a minute. Right now we need to get you sitting up.” She didn’t wait for an answer this time, couldn’t bear to see him struggling to hear and comprehend what she was telling him. She slid one of her arms behind his back and reached the other hand across his chest to grab his arm. “Okay, on three,” she said, just in case he had heard her this time. “One, two, three.”

She grunted and heaved as hard as she could and managed to get him partway up. She didn’t have the strength to get him completely upright, not with the heavy helmet collar weighing him down, but just as she thought she was going to have to let him fall back to the floor, she felt his arms stiffen, bracing against the floor to help hold his own weight. With that bit of assistance, she managed to get him completely sitting up. She tilted him a bit further forward so his chest was leaning on the arm she had across the front of him, then reached up with her other hand to undo the collar latches on the back of the suit.

She quickly realized she was going to need both hands to get the collar over his head. As she was considering the chances he would remain sitting upright if she let go of him, she heard the most wonderful sound in the world, the voice of someone coming to her aid. She looked up and saw Riley hesitating several feet away, a concerned expression on his face. “Need some help there, Martha?”

She gave a sharp nod. “Please.” She sounded a bit desperate to her own ears.

As Riley was kneeling down on the other side of the Doctor, she took a moment to lean him back so she could rest her hand on his forehead again, but he batted at her and said somewhat petulantly, “Your hand is cold.”

She muttered a quick and perfunctory apology, then said to Riley, “I need to get this collar off him. Grab the front, would you?” She slipped a hand under the collar from behind, nodded at Riley, and they both lifted carefully at the same time. As the bottom edge cleared the Doctor’s head, Riley shifted his hands, took the collar from Martha and set it down on the floor.

“Get his gloves, too,” she told Riley, then turned her attention to gently settling the Doctor’s weight a bit more back to the arm she had behind him. He moaned and leaned his head back. “What’s wrong?” she asked, her heart skipping a beat.

“Dizzy. Headache,” he muttered. He winced as he tilted his head forward again, then wiped the back of a shaking hand across his forehead. He pulled his hand away and blinked at it several times.

She looked too and quickly realized what she _wasn’t_ seeing. “You’re not sweating.” Obviously he _had_ been – his hair was completely soaked.

He said in a strangely calm and soft voice, “I know.”

“That’s very bad for a human,” she replied.

He was still looking at his hand, turning it over and back and stretching his fingers wide. “Very bad for me as well.”

She took a deep breath to calm herself and gather her thoughts. It was obvious he was going to need some medical attention, and she was going to have to be the one to provide it. “Alright then,” she said decisively. “First things first. We should get the rest of this suit off you. I imagine it must be designed to keep body heat in.”

The Doctor nodded weakly and said quietly, “Oh, you are clever, Martha Jones.”

He started to fumble at the buckles on the front of the suit, but she grabbed his hands firmly. “Let me take care of that. You just rest.”

He nodded again, closed his eyes, and heaved an exhausted sigh.

Martha looked up at Riley, who was hovering anxiously nearby. “Would you come over here and sit behind him, keep him from falling back?” Riley quickly settled to the floor with his legs to either side of the Doctor and the Doctor pulled securely back against his chest.

Martha nodded her thanks, then quickly evaluated the spacesuit to decide the quickest and easiest way to get it off. She had plenty of experience getting clothing off injured patients in record time, but this was another matter altogether. Even if she had a pair of scissors, she doubted it would cut through the thick material of the suit.

Best to start with the boots. She scooted down to his feet, undid buckles and tugged hard to get the boots to slide off. His feet were bare underneath. He must’ve yanked his socks off with his shoes in his haste to get into the spacesuit. A memory flashed through her mind of him pulling his shoes and socks off on the Moon and tossing them into the bin. That image was quickly followed by one of him lying barefoot on the floor, apparently dead at the Plasmavore’s hand. She shook her head, took a deep breath, crawled back towards where Riley was carefully supporting the Doctor, and started on the buckles at the top of the suit.

She was intent on her work, her hands quick and sure, but when she pulled the front zipper down and saw his shirt and the t-shirt beneath, both sweat-soaked and clinging to his chest, she swallowed hard to maintain her composure. He’d almost died to save her. He still might. She laid a hand gently on his chest. It was even hotter than his face, and she could feel both his hearts racing.

She slipped the top of the suit off his shoulders and was momentarily confused when she didn’t find his suit jacket. He must’ve pulled that off before putting the spacesuit on. Silly to wear a suit jacket inside a spacesuit – suit in a suit, rather redundant. She felt a faint smile tugging at her lips. She could easily imagine the Doctor saying just that and knew exactly what his tone of voice and facial expression would be.

She thought a moment about the best way to get the top of the suit down and off his arms. She wasn’t used to doing this on the floor with the patient sitting up and no recourse to cutting the clothing off. She ended up straddling the Doctor’s legs, slipping her hands inside the spacesuit and hooking him under the arms to take his weight. He twitched and choked out a harsh giggle. “Ticklish,” he muttered. She might’ve laughed if the heat radiating off his forehead as it rested against her shoulder hadn’t reminded her how serious the situation was.

She nodded at Riley, and he pushed the sleeves down and over the Doctor’s slack and unresisting arms. The Doctor shivered slightly. She told herself it was just a reaction to  cooler air hitting his body. The fact that the hot and humid air in the ship’s corridor could be considered cool in relation to his body temperature only added to her already mounting worry.

She leaned the Doctor back again, but his head hung limply forward. She firmly grabbed his arms and called his name. When he didn’t respond, she moved her hands to either side of his head and gently turned his face up towards her. His eyes were closed and his breath was coming through his open mouth in short gasps. “Doctor?” she called again, this time a bit louder.

He jerked, sucked in a harsh breath, and his eyes snapped open. She lowered her hands slowly, relieved that he was now holding his own head up. But then he looked around wildly before his eyes locked on her. He didn’t speak and looked confused, as if he didn’t recognize her or didn’t know what was going on, maybe both. Then he moaned, squeezed his eyes shut again, and his head flopped back against Riley’s shoulder.

Fear rattled Martha for a moment. Her eyes darted all around them as she said, “We have to get him cooled off.”

“But how?” Riley asked. “Everything’s still blazing hot!”

“I know that!” she snapped back. She was starting to panic a bit. This wasn’t a hospital and she didn’t have anything she would normally use in a situation like this.

In the momentary silence, she heard the Doctor mutter, “Stasis chamber.” She stared at him for a moment, her mind locked in a flashback of him screaming at her to take him to the stasis chamber, to freeze it out of him.

Riley calling her name sharply snapped her out of the memory. “Of course. Should’ve thought of that,” she muttered, feeling a bit numb. “Riley, help me get him up.”

Together, they managed to pull the Doctor to his feet. She blocked out his strangled moaning, tersely told Riley to hold him, then knelt down and yanked the rest of the spacesuit from his legs. The last thing they needed was the bottom half of the suit slipping down and getting tangled around his legs. She vaguely noted that his trousers were as sweat-soaked as his shirts. She was angry with herself for not thinking of the stasis chamber immediately. She wasn’t thinking clearly, but now she was viciously determined to keep herself focused.


	3. Breaking the Surface

Martha and Riley mostly dragged the Doctor to the med center. She thought he’d probably passed out, but she didn’t want to stop to check. When they finally got him on the stasis chamber’s gurney, she saw that he did seem to be unconscious, and no amount of slapping his face or calling his name would revive him beyond a wordless groan. In frustration she yelled, “I don’t know what your normal body temperature is!”

Riley reached over and grabbed her arm, said calmly, “Thirty-seven degrees, Martha.”

She gritted her teeth. “That’s normal for a human, Riley. He’s not human.” She ignored Riley’s startled expression. She knew the Doctor’s normal body temperature was quite a bit lower than a human’s, he’d said as much to her when she’d once asked him why his hands were always so cool. She didn’t know what the exact number was, though. She took a deep breath. She’d just have to guess.

She turned to the stasis chamber’s control panel, but stopped short when she saw the panel was dark. “Damn it! The power’s still out.”

Riley said, “I’ll take care of it,” and was out the door before she could say anything in reply.

Now she had to wait. Waiting was not something she had ever done well when operating in emergency mode. She looked up at the ceiling and let out a frustrated almost-scream to vent some of her anger and fear. When she grew quiet again, drawing in deep, slow breaths to steady herself, she heard the Doctor muttering something unintelligible. She was back at his side in an instant, taking his hand in hers and rubbing her thumbs over the back of his hand. “I’m here, Doctor. It’s all right. I’m here.” At least he wasn’t shrieking in agony this time.

He responded to her touch, turning slightly toward her and slowly opening his eyes – eyes that flashed with light. She jerked back, her mind momentarily convinced the sun hadn’t been completely expelled from him. Then as his head turned a bit more, she realized the glow in his eyes was just a reflection from the lights above. She blew out a shaky breath.

He spoke again, saying something garbled that she couldn’t understand. Then his eyes turned up into his head and he started to convulse. “Damn it!” she spat out, reached over and heaved him onto his side. She threw herself across his body so he wouldn’t shake himself right off the gurney and onto the floor.

What seemed like endless minutes later, Riley skidded back into the room. “Power’s back on!” he called out. She shot a glance back to the control panel, realized she wasn’t going to be able to operate it while still holding on to the Doctor. Riley seemed to have anticipated her need. He was already there, putting his arms across the Doctor’s body and nodding at her.

She turned, quickly punched in her best guess at the target temperature and stood ready to push the lever to slide the gurney into the stasis chamber. She looked across her shoulder, trying hard to not look at the Doctor’s contorted features as the seizure continued to wrack his body. She looked at Riley instead, saw the confusion in his eyes. She said with a calmness she didn’t feel anywhere but on the surface, “I don’t want to put him in there while he’s still seizing. Shouldn’t be much longer.”

Riley nodded and swallowed hard, then glanced down at the Doctor as he said nervously, “I’ve never seen someone having a seizure.”

“It’s a febrile seizure,” she said quietly, falling back on medical knowledge to steady herself. She crossed her arms tightly over her chest and walked back to the gurney. “It happens when someone’s temperature is too high.” She laid a hand carefully on the Doctor’s cheek, but his head jerked away from her touch, so she moved her hand to his shoulder and looked sadly down at his face, at his eyes squeezed tightly closed, at his lips pulled back in a grimace, his teeth clenched so hard the muscles in his neck were straining. “If the increase in body temperature is large enough, the brain can be affected.” She briefly closed her eyes. _It’s affecting his brain. His beautiful, clever brain._ She blinked quickly as tears began to burn her eyes. Crying wouldn’t do anything now but interfere with what she needed to do.

Fortunately, the seizure didn’t last much longer. After a final spasm shuddered through the Doctor’s body, Martha helped Riley roll him onto his back again. She gently shifted the Doctor’s head so it was straight, noting that his respiration was quick and shallow. When she quickly put her fingers to his neck, feeling for the strange double thump of two hearts, she found his pulses were so fast and erratic that it felt as if the artery was twitching and vibrating. And the heat that met her fingers was still almost painful to her skin. But he was alive, still hanging on.

She stepped back to the control panel and pushed the lever, watched the gurney slide back into the chamber, then hit the activation button with only slightly less trepidation than she’d felt when she had to do it before. She immediately felt a frigid breeze flutter out of the chamber and allowed herself a small breath of relief. She nodded to herself, then explained to Riley, “Once he’s cooled down, his body functions should return to normal.” _I hope_ , she added to herself.

Riley blew out a long gust of air. “Good. That’s good. You alright?”

She felt her composure crumbling. “No.” She choked back a sob. He caught her up in a secure embrace, holding her close and rubbing her back slowly.

She closed her eyes and held onto him tightly, wanting comfort and reassurance. She desperately told herself to stop thinking, to stop remembering, the Doctor would be alright, he was the Doctor after all, he had to be alright, he always was.

Minutes passed, and still Riley held her, rocked her slowly from side to side. She’d just about calmed down when he said hesitantly, “His feet are twitching.”

Martha whipped back around, went and laid her hand on one of the Doctor’s bare feet. The foot was trembling.

“Is it another seizure?” Riley asked.

“No, I don’t think so,” Martha replied, momentarily confused. “He’s already cooled down quite a bit. Almost to the target temperature, I think.” She peered up into the chamber and saw that the Doctor’s entire body was shaking, but not anywhere near as severely as it had during the seizure.

Then she heard the Doctor gasping, “Martha. Martha, please stop. Please.” She instantly went and hit the stop button without even thinking about it. If he said to stop, she was going to stop. She pulled the lever to slide the gurney back out of the chamber and was relieved to see the Doctor’s eyes open and looking at her lucidly. “Too much, too fast,” he whispered, his teeth chattering.

“Oh! Oh, god, I’m so sorry!” she blurted out. “I had to guess at your normal body temperature.”

“S’alright,” he said, almost stuttering. “It was a…good guess.” He paused, swallowed, took a deep, shaky breath. “Just give me a moment to…” He choked out a laugh. “Warm up. Just a bit.”

She started to laugh and cry at the same time. Wiping at her eyes, she said, “Yes, of course.” He nodded and closed his eyes, gasped a bit, then started shivering even harder. She gulped down a returning shred of panic, looked up and said, “Riley, is there a–” She stopped short. Riley was already handing her a blanket, grey and rough, but serviceable. She thanked him with a small smile, then unfolded the blanket over the Doctor and tucked the edges around his body. One of the Doctor’s hands snaked up to clutch the edge of the blanket near his face, his fingers clenching and unclenching rhythmically.

She smiled at him fondly, then reached up to brush a bit of hair off his forehead. His hair was still damp but cool now, on its way to drying and starting to stiffen a bit. On an impulse, she raked her fingers up both sides of his head, pushing the hair back up into a somewhat tidy mess on the top of his head. He opened his eyes to glare at her in annoyance, but she laughed and said, “Your vanity will thank me later.”

His eyes drifted closed again, his only answer a low hum in his throat.


	4. Washed Ashore

When the Doctor woke, he found himself pleasantly warm. He blinked up at the ceiling, trying to piece together what had happened, and found he was having some difficulty putting the fragments of memory back together. He frowned and tried to sit up, but his body didn’t seem to want to cooperate.

“You might not want to try getting up just yet.”

He turned his head slightly, blinked a bit more and finally focused on Martha, looking down at him with a smile on her face. “Hey,” she said softly.

“Hello,” he answered, his voice cracking a bit. He looked around the room, trying to fit what he saw into his garbled memories.

“Brain a bit scrambled?” she asked. She seemed very anxious on that score for some reason.

“Apparently.” He could tell his answer was doing nothing to reassure her, so he smiled and added, “Not to worry. It’ll sort itself out. It always does.”

She nodded and breathed a sigh of relief. Had she really been that concerned? He was fine. He tried to sit up again to prove it, and he did manage to raise his head and turn to the side a bit this time.

 “Stubborn,” Martha muttered as she helped him sit all the way up.

“Yep. That I am.” He winced as a sharp pain flared behind his eyes, but it quickly faded, leaving only a lingering hint of nausea.

Martha asked gently, “Do you remember what happened?”

He frowned and concentrated as images and sounds slithered and slipped into place. “For the most part. Bits and pieces, most of them not…very nice.” He inhaled sharply and changed the subject. “I wasn’t asleep very long, was I?”

“Maybe all of twenty minutes.”

“More than enough!” he declared cheerfully, then turned and slung his legs over the side of the gurney so he could get down. The sudden movement caused his head to throb and set the room spinning around him.

“Whoa!” Martha said, throwing her arm around his shoulders to steady him. “I think you’d better just sit there for a minute.”

He carefully scooted back as far as he could without falling off the other side of the gurney. The edge down by his knees seemed a bit unsafe at the moment. He drew a deep breath, but instead of it calming him, he found the actual effect was to make him more than a bit tetchy. He realized he’d neglected to push the blanket back before his aborted attempt to get himself back down to the ground. It was now tangled around his legs, and it was very, very annoying. He kicked at it and muttered, “Don’t think I need that any longer.”

Martha snorted. “Honestly, sometimes you remind me of a temperamental five-year-old.” She carefully let go of him, then pulled the blanket off and rolled it up. “Next thing you know, you’ll be asking me for a bedtime story and a glass of water.”

When he tried to shoot a less-than-polite reply back at her, his voice caught in his throat. He swallowed hard and abandoned the retort. “Maybe…maybe I _could_ use a glass of water. A bit parched.”

Martha looked behind him to the other side of the room, addressing someone he couldn’t see. He thought better of whipping his still throbbing head around to see who it was. The movement might actually cause his head to explode. “Riley,” Martha said, “could you–”

“Right. Back in a moment.”

The Doctor caught sight of Riley as he headed toward the door. He looked exhausted and was possibly a bit dirtier than before. Martha also seemed very tired and was certainly sweatier than he’d ever seen her. More than a bit smudged with grime as well. And he himself – not especially tired. He hazarded a sniff, pulled his head back up and blew a sharp breath back out through his nose – he positively reeked. Might be a good idea to shut off his sense of smell for a bit. If only he could figure out which part of his brain was supposed to do that.

“Oh, um, Riley,” Martha called. Riley stopped and turned back toward her, a slightly worried expression on his face. “I think I could use some water too, if you don’t mind.”

“Not at all,” Riley replied with an obviously relieved smile. “Water all around.” He paused. “Well, to drink at least. I’m afraid we don’t have a shower.” He stopped short. Was he actually blushing? Hard to tell if it was that or just skin flushed from the lingering heat. “Not that you need– I mean–” he stammered.

Martha laughed. “Yes, I do.” She glanced down at herself. “A long one, with lots of soap. But just a drink of water would be wonderful right now.” Riley grinned at her, nodded and left. He seemed a bit smitten with Miss Martha Jones. The Doctor turned and looked at her appraisingly. He couldn’t deny she was reasonably attractive. According to human standards at least. He liked to think his tastes were more eclectic than that, but he’d never had anything other than human and human-appearing travelling companions. Just made it easier he supposed. No gawking and staring and silly questions. Well, at first anyway.

Martha finally glanced back at the Doctor, her smile turning to a frown. She put her hand to her cheek. “What, do I have smudges of dirt all over my face?”

“Well…yes, you do.” He shook himself out of his contemplative mood and said, “Not to worry, though. The vent chamber shouldn’t take much longer to cool down to a tolerable level. We’ll be back on the TARDIS sooner than soon. Plenty of showers there. There have to be at least…” He tried to mentally count them up and quickly got muddled as to which ones he’d already counted. He knew his thought processes would sort themselves out soon enough, but it was bloody frustrating in the meantime. “Several. Definitely several. Even more bathtubs. More than several. For some reason women like to take baths. Never quite understood that one. Maybe you can explain it to me later. Oh, wait, you take showers. Not that I…would notice such things. You must’ve mentioned it to me. Or I heard the water running. Or, something…”

He was tongue-tied for the briefest of brief moments, hardly more than a second. Speech centers were still lagging a bit, but his mouth didn’t seem to be hindered by that. In fact, his mouth was probably was going to get him in trouble very soon, judging from the look of strained patience on Martha’s face, but he couldn’t help himself. “Lots of bath products as well – that’s just self-preservation. And there’s a swimming pool. And a babbling brook – a bit like me, babbling, bibble-babbling. Oh, and a sauna…which I may just jettison as soon as we get back.”

They shared an uneasy laugh over that, then he looked at her very seriously. A slight frown creased her face, as if she were afraid of what he was going to say next. “Thank you, Martha,” he said very sincerely.

She looked as if she didn’t quite know what to make of being thanked. It wasn’t as if he never thanked her for anything. Maybe he was thanking her too much? Some humans thrived on praise, others were made uncomfortable by it. He still wasn’t quite sure which type Martha was.

“You’re welcome,” she finally said very quietly, then added, “That’s four for six, by the way. Not a good average. You really need to look after yourself better.”

He had no idea at first what she meant, then he remembered she seemed to be keeping track of the number of times when she’d had to “look after” him, as she phrased it. So maybe she was the kind who needed extra praise. “That’s what I have you for,” he said, but that made her look even more uncomfortable than being thanked. There was an awkward pause. Probably time to change the subject again.

“Right,” Martha suddenly said brightly, “Think you’re ready to get down now?” Apparently she wanted to change the subject as well. Who was he to argue?

He looked down. The floor didn’t seem to be quite so far away now, and it was holding steady. “Yes. Definitely.” He slid down cautiously, one of Martha’s arms around his shoulders, her other arm reaching across him and holding on to his arm. He fervently hoped she’d never have to hold him like that again. He’d barely escaped a regeneration this time.

“You okay?” She asked.

He took a moment to evaluate – nothing seemed to be moving that shouldn’t be moving – and nodded. She loosened her arms, and he tried to take a step, but his legs seemed to have other ideas about moving. Fortunately, Martha caught him and helped him over to a chair, then stood looking at him with her hands on her hips. He muttered in annoyance, “You knew that was going to happen, didn’t you?”

She nodded and said “Yep,” in a perfect imitation of him. That was even more annoying, but he kept that fact to himself. Sometimes humans liked to be annoying on purpose. She added, thankfully in her normal tone of voice, “That one’s just about a hospital cliché.”

Another awkward pause. He couldn’t think of a subject change. His brain seemed to have stalled. Really and truly irritating. If he could get up without falling over, he’d be sorely tempted to beat his head against the nearest bulkhead to get his brain to snap back into alignment.

Again, Martha took care of the subject change. She pointed a finger toward the door and said, “I’m just going to go and find your shoes and jacket. I assume you left them somewhere around the airlock?”

He nodded and said, “But you don’t have to do that.” He wasn’t quite sure if he simply didn’t want her to leave just yet – which was ridiculous because there was nothing sentient alive on this ship now but himself and a few humans – or if he didn’t want her fetching his clothing because of his extreme dislike of anyone waiting on him.

She replied with a small grin, “Yes, I do. You look daft with one shoe, but you look even more daft with no shoes. Sorry, never told you that on the Moon. We were sort of…busy…at the time.” She seemed to be lost in thought for a moment, then shook her head and said, “You just stay right there, mister. Almost-doctor’s orders. I don’t want to come back here and find you’ve knocked yourself silly falling on the floor.”

He glanced down at the floor. “Don’t want that,” he said. “That floor really is filthy.” Martha laughed, and as he looked back up at her, he added, “And I’d probably look _supremely_ daft stretched out on the floor with no shoes on.” He instantly realized that particular comment was very high on the list of things he really shouldn’t have said to her at that moment. He knew from the pained look on her face that she was thinking about the Moon again, recalling a moment he was amazed he had gotten back up from. Another time she’d saved him from regeneration. “Sorry,” he muttered. “I’ll just be quiet now.”

Her expression instantly shifted to amusement, “Oooh, so you actually can do that voluntarily?” He started to say something, he wasn’t sure what it would’ve been, but she cut him off with a raised finger. “Ah! Let me enjoy the moment.”

“Martha,” he said with an exasperated sigh.

“Oh, you had to go and ruin it. See if you can stay sitting in that chair for the next few minutes, okay? Humor me.”

“I think I can do that. Sitting still _and_ humoring you, both at the same time even.”

That seemed to satisfy her. “Be back in a minute. Should probably check where Riley is with that drink of water while I’m at it.”

“Good idea.” He started to shift in the chair to make himself a bit more comfortable. He should’ve waited until she was all the way out of the room.

She glared at him. “It’d be nice if you’d humor me for more than a few seconds.”

He raised his hands in surrender. “Fine! Not moving. Not going anywhere until you get back.”

A strange expression passed over her face, a bit like worry, but mixed with something else. It was gone before he could figure it out. “Good,” she said firmly and nodded. “That’s good.” Then she turned and left.

She didn’t really think he was going to leave, did she? What, hop in the TARDIS without her, abandon her here, so far from where she belonged? He’d never do something like that, at least not willingly. Maybe she needed reassurance more than she needed praise. He’d have to do something about that, as soon as they got back to the TARDIS.  He had just the thing in mind – her own key. She’d deserved it, had more than earned it. That much he could give her.

*****

The End


End file.
